So yesterday I was talking about how amazing Unique was on Glee. To recap: significantly amazing. Interesting though was that the episode had a HUGE plot hole but still managed to be amazing.

So Wade was supposed to be an outcast who the Vocal Adrenaline coach dismissed as a poor member of the high energy team. Yet somehow at sectionals – SECTIONALS(!) – there managed to be a full number choreographed around Wade, as Unique, as the main vocalist.

That’s the thing about plot holes; if the moment is amazing you can kinda overlook them, such as in this case. If they’re anything less than amazing the plot hole is obvious and disastrous and completely distracting (I can’t think of a good example here, if you’ve got something please mention it in the comments).

Finally, I know I reused the same image from yesterday in this post but let’s be honest, THAT GIF IS AMAZING so I’m going with it. Such is life.

Now, you all know my feelings on the amazingness that is Ru Paul’s Drag Race. Well, last week on Glee they did a tribute to Saturday Night Fever, unfortunately titled “Saturday Night Glee-ver,” that really worked for a lot of reasons. First of all, the songs were good. And not just the originals, which are obviously AMAZING, but the songs kind of lend themselves to cover because in my mind they’re less about the vocalist than the feeling of the song. Also, in Glee’s favour was a fantastic storyline introducing us to the above cross dressing diva sensation UNIQUE. It’s not clear yet whether Unique is transgender, a drag queen or one of the many other options we are happy to accept in the alphabet community, but of one thing we are certain, SHE IS SICKENING.

In introducing herself to Kurt and Mercedes, in dream sequence, Unique struts forth with the following:

“Kurt Hummel and Mercedes Jones,
Unique worships the red carpet you walk on.
If you two had a love child… it would be Unique!
And Unique’s grandparents would be Andre Leon Talley and Beyonce,
because only the best will do for Unique!”

Unique is perfection. We need to see more of her.

This week’s Glee was a Whitney tribute that was significantly less successful than the Saturday Fever episode. First, too many tributes so close together can get a bit much. Second, there was no Unique. More importantly – yes, even that Unique(!) – was the fact that covering Whitney – even if it’s covering Whitney covering Dolly – is almost always a mistake. Whitney songs are all about the vocals of Whitney and being frank there are few people who can live up to that. The only song that was really a success was – one of my favourite Whitney songs – How Will I Know, which they smartly changed into a bit of a slowy. It was a gospel choir short of an A.

The rest of Whitney’s back catalogue was performed almost exclusively as straight covers and was frankly a mess. I DON’T NEED TO HEAR THAT! Particularly the woeful cover of It’s Not Right But It’s Okay, which was neither right or okay. Not your best week Glee. Such is life I suppose.

As a bit of a side note my old roommate Fallon was at work one day – she works at coffee shop – and one of her co-workers asked her if she watched Glee to which she replied: “I used to watch it but then it got really bad.”
To which her co-worker intoned: “Oh, because there’s [star of Glee] Cory Monteith” who was literally directly behind Fallon as she mocked the show to which he had hitched his rising star.
Cue embarrassed silence from Fallon.

Continuing on from yesterday another video that Ryan, Bobby, and I rather enjoy watching and dancing along to is the mash-up of Adele’s Rumour Has It and Someone Like You from Glee. It is easily the performance on the year from Glee which has been a bit hit and miss musically this season. Not so here with The Troubletones firing on all cylinders giving us both sickening vocals and some emotional realness.

So one night Ryan and I were properly giving it to this video: shoulder pops, head tilts, pigeon strutting, the works. Needless to say we had been drinking, also that it was amazing. Toward the end we lined up Santana and Mercedes styles only to realize that we had an audience! A group of people celebrating the end of a long moving day – for they had replaced the awful, and heretofore unmentioned, balcony-as-storage-room people – had been watching our entire routine!

They were actually delightful and after a brief bout of stage fright for yours truly – from which Ryan, ever the performer it seems, did not suffer – we held our drinks aloft to them and cheersed across the chasm that is downtown life. We may never meet them face to face but we made some new friends that night.

Another big reason for this is the Hummel’s in whom Glee has found it’s heart. Burt Hummel will surely go down in the televisual pantheon as one of the mediums greatest fathers; from grappling with his son’s gaiety to defending him with vigor in one short season. Burt’s unconditional love and support of Kurt has brought about some of the more heartfelt moments on the show, none moreso than when Burt has held newly minted stepson Finn to account for his lax attitude to Kurt’s bullying.

Carole (nee Hudson) has been with us since the pilot and has progressed from down-trodden single mother to empowered everywoman subsequently falling for, the aforementioned, Burt. Their wedding proved to be a highpoint both musically and narratively so far this season.

The amount of times I have watched that video is now hovering in the double digits and I have yet to view it without getting a little misty when Carole makes her appearance and struts down the isle.

[SIDENOTE: A friend of mine – who is getting married himself next year – recently assumed I am a wedding crier. I was a little insulted – not as insulted as I was when other friends of mine eloped: ELOPING IS THE ULTIMATE INSULT! – until I realized, to my horror, that I AM a wedding crier. I suppose that’s life. End sidenote.]

Back to Glee though, what is so amazing about the above clip and Teenage Dream from yesterday is not only that they capture great narrative moments, but that the songs are great too. Both Marry You and Teenage Dream sound great in Glee-style and are good enough in their own right separate from the originals, which has not always been the case until recently again.

Oh, and I thought Rachel was singing “this dancing jew” – which to be fair is a much better lyric – not this dancing juice. That is the last piece of the puzzle in my mind that will take Glee back to top form: edge. The show has lost it’s edge a little, and I can’t imagine them mentioning a student’s gag reflex anymore – as they did in episode two – which is a shame. One reason for this is the less-frequent appearances of the deranged Terri (former wife to Will), who is evil and AMAZING. Also there needs to be more Emma Pillsbury (equally amazing but significantly less evil).

[Another SIDENOTE: How awful is the lyric “this dancing juice?” I honestly thought it must’ve been a Glee thing to remove some profanity or other in the original only to discover (aghast) that it IS the original. Seriously? It doesn’t really even rhyme. And if that’s what you’re going for so many other things rhyme with juice. The colour puce? A giant moose? The Christmas Truce? Or if you’re stuck on juice, why not “this gin and juice” or something? Poorly-played Bruno Mars, poorly-played. End sidenote.]

Those of you who have been reading this blog for a while know that I was a huge fan of Glee when it first premiered over 2 years ago and I continued to espouse the greatness of Glee for many months to follow.

While I have continued to enjoy Glee during the time that I have not being blogging about it maniacally, it has undoubtedly fallen below the par set during the first thirteen episodes when it was far and away the freshest and funniest programme on television.

I think it has turned a corner.

That is to say that I’ve happy-cried during two of the last three episodes. It all started with an episode entitled “Never Been Kissed” which sees Kurt venturing to a private school in a mission to scout out a rival glee club. This is where he finds a boy named Blaine (played by the above pictured Darren Criss) and discovers that there are gays out there that aren’t harassed or ignored. Also Blaine is hot.

This is something that was never on TV when I was growing up. It may seem trivial but this storyline, and the gentle swoonsome attraction between Kurt and Blaine, is something completely fresh and exciting to a mainstream primetime show. Blaine sings “Teenage Dream” in Kurt’s direction and Kurt all but melts. I was pretty much the same on my couch, being honest.

AMAZING.

[Sidenote, no one is more into this song than the dude standing next to Kurt. He is Breaking. It. Out.]

I know I’m a big gay but I really do feel like the Kurt storyline is single-handedly turning Glee around. The most important part of that though is the bullying storyline which adds some important depth to what is a very frothy show. It kind of grounds the ridiculousness somehow.

For too long in the second part of the first season and early this season Glee just seemed to meander and frivolously pick up and drop storylines simply to get a bunch of songs out. This storyline not only seems to have legs but adds some much needed gravity to a show threatening to float away into Karaoke Hour with Lea Michelle.

This post wasn’t originally going to be a two-parter but brevity is not my strong suit when I’m talking Glee.

In For The Kill is far and away the best song of the year, although I still prefer the original leaked version to the one that went on to dominate airwaves in the UK. Shark in the Water is a song that deserves so much more love than it received during its less than stellar chart run and really is amazing in every possible way. While it was supposed to be the year of Little Boots her thunder was rather stolen by the aforementioned La Roux and the explosion of Gaga, with Bad Romance being far and away her greatest track to date. A couple of Canadian entries at 8 and 9 with the indomitable Dragonette and Big Onion heroes The Autistics.

Interestingly, or not, four of the top five acts have names beginning with L. Leona Lewis was clearly hoping that by utilising a double L – and celebrity alphabet game reversing – name she would be well in for the top spot but she didn’t (x) factor in the fact that she has no personality which undoubtedly hurts her chances.

Girls Aloud’s rather unfortunate single edit of the over 6 minute epic that is Untouchable is the only reason that release didn’t crack the top 10 and Lily Allen’s The Fear proved that the gobby little shit is actually a real talent that can craft a killer pop song – what’s all this talk of her retiring? Also, what the fuck happened to the Black Eyed Peas this year? I’d always sort of enjoyed them (Shut Up, etc.) on the periphery but this year they blew up with the killer I Gotta Feelin – LA HEIM! – and Meet Me Halfway. Also, Beyonce’s Halo is EPIC.

The Glee cast recording of Don’t Stop Believin’ is probably in my top 5 recordings of the year but I don’t technically consider it a single so I’m leaving it here at the bottom. Separate but better than anything from Leona down.

1. glee was on again tonight. it was a good episode but not as good as the previous two. it seemed a little early put impediments in the way of glee club like the ‘acafellas.’ but really i’m just nitpicking because it’s still better than everything else of tv.

also, the episode highlighted the problem of young ladies not being able to properly identify the gays – from this point forward i’m going to call this the ‘mickey ‘mo quandary’ – that i mentioned the other day. bravo glee for focussing the spotlight on a major issue being faced by young ladies in the new millennium! hopefully the teen girls of america were watching and took note and we can quell the forthcoming epidemic.